If you are using Odoo’s Manufacturing module, you may have noticed the Plan button on manufacturing orders. This button appears on confirmed manufacturing orders, when the related Bills of Materials have predefined operations. But what does this button do?
When you click the Plan button, Odoo tries to find the first available time slot for each work order based on the work center’s schedule, the manufacturing order's scheduled date, and each work order’s estimated duration. If the Work Order Dependency option is enabled, dependencies between work orders are considered. Otherwise, the system plans work orders based on their sorting. During this process, a time slot is created in the Resource Time Off calendar to indicate that the work center is reserved. If the primary work center isn't available, Odoo will check for alternatives.
Once an order is planned, you can unplan it, removing the time slots from the calendar. However, this action isn’t allowed if any work order is already in progress.
Planned work orders are visible in the Planning menu and can be viewed by Manufacturing Order or Work Center, using the submenus: Planning by Production and Planning by Workcenter, respectively.